


Tooth and nail.

by pxrsephoneofeden



Series: Pills and Nails and Tacs [1]
Category: Ouran High School Host Club - All Media Types
Genre: Childhood Memories, F/M, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Headcanon, Healthy Relationships, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Intrigue, Loss, Memories, Mental Health Issues, Not Canon Compliant, Not Happy, Rain, Slice of Life, Slow Burn, Triple Drabble, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-06-30 10:26:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15749817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pxrsephoneofeden/pseuds/pxrsephoneofeden
Summary: Haruhi spends the night with Kyoya, and she begins to question things she’d assumed about him from before.





	1. Smile like a real boy

**Author's Note:**

> \- my attempt at a slightly angst mini series
> 
> \- no one loves kyoharu but I adore this pairing so much I could write a million things for them
> 
> \- my headcanons about Kyoya’s family are quite depressing so if you want a happy fic like my others typically are I’d click off this work

Raindrops hit the side of the tall Victorian window in a three by three pattern. The sound of a pencil scratching the sharply imprinted lines of paper were louder than ever to her ears.

Ever since she’d been there it felt like neither of them had spoken.

They had. It just wasn’t worth any thought.

The last time Haruhi had been alone with Kyoya they were reluctantly wandering around a mall. He’d told her several things that echoed through her mind as she sat across from him, pretending to write a report for their project from an elective due the next Monday.

She almost jumped when Kyoya suddenly rose from the bed and muttered an “I’ll be back...” before swiftly stepping out of the room.

Kyoya’s bedroom was really more like a loft apartment. Haruhi thought, it must at least be the size of the apartment she shared with her father. The bed was on the downstairs portion, and there was an open part up a set of stairs that led to what looked like a library with a window nook. The only thing about the room that Haruhi found humorous was the fact Kyoya had a mini fridge in the corner closest to the bed, adjacent from a desk (covered in intriguing scratches on the legs) with a very pricey looking laptop rested on top of it.

With Kyoya gone, Haruhi allowed herself to gaze into the room. The things he’d said at the mall that day knocking the back of her head in.

“I’m the product of excellent breeding.”

She scoffed as that comment bled through her ears as if he actually just said it to her and it wasn’t a vivid memory. Excellency lived in this very room. Everything down to the mini fridge looked like it was unreasonably priced and luxurious. The bed was twice as big as the one she slept in, and with a quick look to the door, she found herself laying into the mattress and sighing in tense releasing bliss deeply. She stared up at the wall and cocked a brow at what she saw. The veiny crack in the ceiling looked alien to the immaculate room, and she jumped back up from her resting position as a large raindrop fell onto the top of her nose. 

She thought out loud, “Why on earth would Kyoya senpai have a cracked ceiling that he didn’t immediately fix. There’s no way in hell he hasn’t noticed it yet.”

Haruhi lifted her legs up over the edge of the bed and plopped her feet on the ground. She surveyed the area of the room she’s trained her eyes not to pry at.

The next memorable comment rang like the school dismissal bell.

“There’s nothing important for you to know about my family.”

It wasn’t until she heard that over and over again that she realized there weren’t any pictures on the walls. No posters, no family pics, not even one of the host club. The walls were a barren ghost town of ivory wallpaper. Haruhi hadn’t even thought about the fact that apart from his dad, she hadn’t even seen any other members of his family. She only just knew they existed, similar to how even though they’ve never seen him, a child would believe in Santa.

She walked aimlessly around the room searching for anything that could tell her more about her strange...

Friend?

Acquaintance?

Male classmate who blackmailed her for months and held her into a bed to make a point?

We’ll stick with acquaintance, she thought.

Her icy fingertips brushed the wall, as if that by touching it, a picture of a happy family would appear, and a smiling Kyoya would be at the center of it.

Had she ever even seen him smile? A smile that wasn’t fake or forced. Something that wasn’t a smirk or an angry uncontrollable lip twitch?

How sad, she pondered, a life where there are people you’ve been acquainted with for almost a year don’t know what your smile looks like.

A small pull out table next to a light switch became her treasure chest. Underneath a purple glass lamp sat an untouched family picture album.

She ripped the lamp from the book and grabbed it like it would disappear. Then she realized what she was doing and dropped it like it would burn her if she didn’t.

“I can’t do this to him. It’s an invasion of privacy-“

She was cut off talking to herself by a text buzz in her back left pocket.

Sure enough it was Kyoya. She swallowed hard and bit her lip like he knew what she was doing up in his room. The text told her that he had to step out with his dad and that he was sorry. She told him she’d keep working on the project (she lied) until he got back. 

Cautiously bending down to reclaim the portrait book, she shoved her phone back into her pocket and walked herself over back to the bed. She slowly opened the book and was left feeling unsatisfied.

An old picture with a very tall man that looked like Kyoya’s dad with white hair, baggy under eyes, and a long wrinkle on his forehead took center stage on page one. Underneath it were pictures of the same man with a short, and unhappy looking older woman who never showed her teeth in any pictures. 

She flipped another page and felt her mouth betray her in a smile. The picture was of a boy in tiny glasses, with tiny hands, and a set of large grey brown eyes, smiling while holding an annoyed white cat. The boy in the picture was smiling so hard you could see his missing right canine. 

The plastic at the top of the page clung to Haruhi’s fingers, begging to be pulled back. She reluctantly peeled back the protective layer and slipped the photo from the placeholder.

‘Kyoya; age 6’ 

Scribbled at the bottom in faded pink pen ink was the confirmation Haruhi wanted. She knew what Kyoya’s smile looked like now.

Or at least that he has the ability to smile.

Or at least he had...

Placing the photo back in its place Haruhi turned another page. Her eyes widened in shock and her smile continued to disobey her brain’s wishes to stop growing.

Kyoya’s dad was younger and missing his gotee, he looked so much like Kyoya in the picture Haruhi could’ve sworn it was just a bad quality picture of him from a host club ball. He was wearing what could only be described as an 80’s tux, and his hand was clasped in with that of an elated looking red headed woman.

Her wedding dress was of its era, along with her heavily curled and hair spray coated hair. She had hair the color of a dying fire. An obvious dye job that somehow suited her. Her eyes were full of life and her smile showed off her deep dimples. 

The photo of the newlywed couple was the first clue that Kyoya even had a mother to begin with, as well as that his father actually had emotions and happiness.

Haruhi let her finger graze over the faces in picture. Nodding to herself and noting how intrusive she was being. She sighed and flipped another page.

Kyoya’s father wasn’t in this picture, but the scribbled writing at the bottom that matched the one with Kyoya and his cat noted that Yoshio Ootori has indeed taken the picture.

In the background was a beautiful waterfall. The red headed woman was laughing at the camera. In one had she held the smaller hand of her son, not Kyoya, but one of his brothers, and in the other she was holding her protruding stomach that was most definitely a pregnant belly. A girl with a face identical to that of toddler Kyoya pulled on the ends of her tight pigtails and smiled while she held onto another little boy trying to sit down on the ground. Kyoya’s other brother and older sister.

Haruhi read the rest of the scribbled handwriting at the bottom of the picture.

‘Niagara falls; six months pregnant; don’t take 3.5 kids across the globe; pic taken by Y.O’

Haruhi continued to flip through the pages of the memory book she’d stumbled upon in Kyoya’s room. Her worried intrigue grew as she got through more and more pictures. As the page numbers got larger, the red headed woman got older and much less happy. She’d stopped writing cute messages at the bottom of pictures around Kyoya’s eighth birthday. Kyoya’s siblings looked less goofy, and Kyoya stopped smiling as much. Haruhi’s smile finally started to fade once she stopped upon a disturbingly different picture in the second to last page of the book.

The Polaroid was taken in what looked like a shady hotel room. The redheaded woman stared icily into the camera with hate filled eyes. Her eyes had lost the life they had in her wedding picture. Her dimples seemed to disappear and her mouth held sharp wrinkled lines around it. Her eyes were bloodshot and her jaw was clenched. The picture underneath wasn’t much reassurance to Haruhi that it was just a weird picture and that everything was ok. 

The second picture was one of Fuyumi, Kyoya’s sister. She’d been crying and her arms were crossed. They were in a courtroom. This wasn’t a Polaroid. She was in her late teens and she wore a long sleeved black sweater over a knee length green dress that almost matched the walls of the room she was in.

Haruhi nervously flipped the page. The last page of the book was one of Kyoya and his siblings, Kyoya was middle school aged and his siblings didn’t look much older than they had in the previous picture of Fuyumi. They’d all been crying and they were all dressed in black. No one looked at the camera, everyone looked down. Kyoya held onto Fuyumi’s arm like he was a scared child. One of this brothers held his hand over his mouth to keep from bursting out in despair. It was the boy holding the red headed woman’s hand. The man beside him looked at Fuyumi sympathetically, like he was thinking about a burden someone had left to her. Fuyumi stared down at ground void of emotion.

Haruhi realized then and there what she was looking at. Kyoya’s mother was dead, and this was his book of memories.

The door opening made her jump out of her body. She shoved the book under the mattress and hoped to god Kyoya would have to leave again so she could put it in its rightful place.

As he stepped through the door she tried to smile unconvincingly.

He chuckled at her.

“You know if you didn’t get anything done it’s ok, you can just come back tomorrow.” He smiled his fake toothless smile at her and glanced outside.

“It’s getting late, you should go home. Tell your father I said hello for me, alright?”

A crack of thunder unexpectedly jolted through the room like an unwelcome guest. Haruhi yelped. She jumped off the bed and clung to his body.

Her face burned and she yanked away from his chest she’d basically assaulted with an nonconsensual hug.

“I’m so sorry Kyoya senpai, I just-“

“Shut it. Just stay the night. Ranka won’t care, they think i'm a good influence and I don’t want you having a panic attack on the side of the road.”

Haruhi cocked her brow.

“Wait... really?”

“Why not? We’re friend right? Plus we can get more done. It’ll benefit the both of us.” He started walking over to the mini fridge and pulled out two lemon ‘La Croix’ cans from its inside.

Benefits. Right. Not bonding.

“Yeah ok... wait what am I gonna wear?” Her voice sounded more pushy than she’d wanted.

He turned his head back to face her and bit the inside of his cheek.

“... you could probably borrow something of Fuyumi’s. She isn’t exactly the same proportions as you but it’ll do for the night, right?”

“Right.” She nodded and he threw her one of the cans. He opened his and sipped it, placed it on the desk and then basically fell back into his bed, grabbing his notebook and immediately picking up where he’d left off from earlier. Haruhi couldn’t help but laugh.

“You’d think you were a machine or something.”

Kyoya looked up to see Haruhi laughing at him. He felt his face heat up.

“I work productivity and without stop. What’s there not to like?”

She sat down across from him.

“I don’t know... it’s just earlier I was just thinking that I’ve never... just forget it we should get to work.”

He hoisted his upper body around and repositioned himself to where he was laying on his stomach. He looked up at her almost childishly.

“No, tell me. If it’s about me I’d appreciate knowing.”

She bit her lip and put her pencil down.

“I’ve never seen you smile... well I mean I have but not a real smile, a host club smile.”

“A host club smile isn’t real?”

“If you aren’t really happy it’s not a real smile.”

“What a peculiar way of thinking.”He said condescendingly as he grabbed his notebook and started scribbling notes. Haruhi, now very annoyed, was still able to notice his handwriting looked really similar to his mom’s. Different from how it’d been before, but she shoved the thought away as she crossed her arms and glared at him. He sighed and looked back up.

“What is it now, Haruhi?” He rolled his eyes and she didn’t know whether she hated him in that moment or felt something more… desirable.

She watched his mouth curl into the signature smirk she’d known him for until today. It looked foreign in comparison to the image of a real smile.

“I’m not dumb for saying that you should be concerned that you rarely smile in a genuine sense, that’s all.”

“I didn’t say you were dumb, I said peculiar. You are indeed a peculiar person Haruhi.” He pushes the bridge of his glasses up on his nose and tilted his head to one side, like an invitation to debate. Haruhi didn’t want to initiate a never ending cycle of sarcasm the two could tie competitively at, so she returned her attention to her paper. Not without an eye roll of course though.

She glanced over at the clock in the far East corner of the room. 8:46pm. It was going to be a long night.

She wrote until her hand ached, four pages later. The two had finished two packs of the gross lemon fizzy water known as La Croix. Communication was once more void and Haruhi now felt a burning guilt for knowing things Kyoya probably didn’t need her to know if he intended on keeping the ice wall between them he’d maintained since the day at the mall.

She knew he was selfless, he could love, and that he had a weight of expectations on him. Hell, she’d even done the impossible feat of winning over Yoshio Ootori’s approval by yelling at him, yet she couldn’t break down that lady wall that could get her fully into the inner workings of Kyoya’s Head.

What infuriated her more was the fact that she was so intrigued by him. No one made her question human behavior like him. She could just stare and watch all day, but in a non creepy way of course.

Of course.

She took another look at the clock. Suddenly it was 9:30, and she’d wasted nearly 45 minuets staring. It would be a long night indeed.


	2. Cold hands are warm to the freezing souls

Haruhi stared into the closet of a teenaged Fuyumi.

Rain and sleet heavily pounded the roof and many windows of the home. At 9:45 a servant came into the room inhabited by the silent teenagers and told Haruhi she could change in Fuyumi’s room. 

Grabbing a grey tank top and a pair of black leggings Haruhi changed as quickly as possible, leaving her sports bra on ( trying to make this opposite sex sleepover as not awkward as she could). She ran a hand through her, now neck length, hair, she looked into a vanity mirror covered in pasty dust, obviously not been touched since Fuyumi left. She thought to herself, even if she’d gotten married and moved away wouldn’t they at least keep the room clean? 

Kyoya has been correct in stating that his sister and Haruhi were proportionally opposites. The tank top nearly fell off of her, being deigned for a much taller woman with breasts larger than an a cup. She sighed and pulled the shirt up enough to cover her as much as possible.

“Kyoya I’m back, are you ready to go to sleep or do you want to keep working?” She said as she pulled the door closed behind her. A thought of unsavory implications the closed door may bring flashed in her brain, but to be honest Kyoya’s house was cold and his room was strangely warm so she didn’t frankly care.

He scoffed at her query. “I’m well tired of working on this but if you think there’s any way in hell I could fall asleep right now you’re mistaken.”

“I thought you loved sleep. I mean I’m not exactly a night owl but I think you might even have Hani senpai beat.”

“I enjoy sleep, It necessarily come naturally to me though. Maybe years of not going to bed until 3am fucked me up a little more than I thought at the time but, I mean, what am I gonna do about it now?”

Hearing Kyoya swear so freely was culture shock. The typically reserved boy could be a snide and often crude person if he truly wanted to. Haruhi didn’t even know how much she liked that until he started giving up on his nice guy act, and then giving up on his cold selfish mask even further.

“Whatever. That isn’t healthy.” She chuckled as she spoke.

He pushed his glasses up, this time with his whole hand, as he spoke much more relaxed, like he was with a friend and not a stranger.

“Yeah! Well if I weren’t fully aware of that and unable to accept the consequences I’d take eight sleeping pills a night!” His fake anger was much funnier than his real anger. Haruhi though that surely this is how everyone is, but Kyoya wasn’t like everyone else, was he?

Kyoya now had on sleep wear too. He actually looked like a normal teenager. Not a ridiculously wealthy wolf in sheeps clothing like Haruhi had expect him to be. He walked over to the bed and patted a spot next to her. A goofy aura surrounding him. Weird.

“Come here Haruhi, we need to entertain ourselves somehow.” With a raised eyebrow and choked back laughter Haruhi knew he must be referencing the only other time we were on a bed together.

“I’ll sit next to you as long as you keep your shirt on this time k?” She laughed and sat down beside him. He had another can of La Croix opened and had been taking sips of it the whole conversation.

“So, Kyoya senpai, what do you want to do if you don’t wanna work or sleep.”

He melodramatically sighed and pretended to think, then Haruhi could tell a real idea entered his head. She felt a nervous twinge as she remembered who she was dealing with.

“Haruhi?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you familiar with truth or dare?” His smirk was back. The Cheshire Cat of a teenage boy pushed his glasses up, singular fingered this time.

Haruhi nodded and gulped. Trust is something you shouldn’t give to a person who could possibly have more dirt on you than you even knew yourself.

Kyoya flicked his tounge across his lip.

“Haruhi, truth or dare?”

As if this were the hardest decision she’d been asked her whole life, she panicked and chose the option most wouldn’t have.

“Truth.” Her blunt emotionless tone earned a cocked eyebrow and half nod.

“Why did I know you’d choose truth... hmm... let’s see...” he stared into space and Haruhi grew more anxious about whatever strange thing he could possibly think to ask her about. He mentally weighed the options of two questions, leaning his head to one side, then the other, and then going back to the other side and nodding.

“Haruhi, were you ever afraid, even for a second, that I would’ve done something to you in Okinawa?”

Her eye widened.

“Of course not, I knew you woul-“

“Be truthful. It’s not like I’m thin skinned or anything.”

She pushed a puff of air out of her mouth and fared at the steel colored bed spread. Mentally putting herself underneath him at Okinawa, she revisited every thought she had in the thirty seconds that seemed to last thirty hours.

“I mean, yeah... if we’re going second by second, when you said ‘pay me back with your body’ my fight or flight sense kicked in a millisecond too late, but then when you went on about leaving myself defenseless I knew this wasn’t what you wanted me to think it was.”

He tilted his head again. What Haruhi had now decided on was his thinking face washed over his features.

“I’m sorry that even for seven seconds I made you that scared. I honestly regret doing that I mean it didn’t even teach you much- it was just dumb really.”

Was Kyoya really apologizing to her. A glance at the clock, 10:22pm. She let go of the inhibitions keeping her contained behind the ice wall and melted a hole in it. Reaching her hand out she grabbed his arm and gave a forgiving smile. If she’d known any better she could’ve sworn he flinched after her touch

“I forgive you.” 

The closest thing to a smile she’d gotten since she met him was now dancing across his mouth it was accompanied by an unexpectedly cute laugh. It was awkward and dorky, everything he wasn’t, but it was perfectly him. He covered his mouth before his smile could reach a peak but he kept laughing. Haruhi forgot he was a person and not a character she’d been watching and yanked his hand from his mouth. She gasped and grinned. She was the Cheshire now. Alice had dimples.

“Kyoya! You have dimples! And you smile! And you laugh! And-“

“Shut up!” The smile went away like a card in a carnival circus trick.

Haruhi’s face went red hot. Oops. 

Struck a nerve have I, she thought.

“I’m sorry again.”

She broke from her internal monologue.

“I didn’t mean to snap I just don’t let myself do that very often I-“

“Why?”

Kyoya has obviously never been interrupted before because his eyes widened in shock, fear, and annoyance all at once.

“Why don’t you ever let yourself smile Kyoya?”

He was mad now.

“I don’t know Haruhi, maybe my memory book of my drug overdosing mom with dimples is enough to make me hate them?!”

He ripped the book from the mattress and Haruhi’s stomach knotted itself into a gordian.

“You violated me in a way I never would have you, and frankly I’m disappointed, Haruhi!”

She was mad too, now.

“At least I never tricked you into thinking you were going to get raped and the burst into a giggle fit upon apologizing! What are you? Bipolar?!”

“Yes.”

Well shit, she thought.


	3. who are you? really?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- I’m so deeply sorry for taking so long to conclude this little mini series and there’s absolutely no excuse but HERE YOU GO!!!
> 
> \- Kyoharu is my favorite ship of all time so I’m definitely gonna wrote more for them, so if you also love them and have a prompt or an idea or an AU you want someone to write I’m always open to suggestions <3

Haruhi had never thought about how many times someone’s heart could beat in a minute until this moment. She counted 176 beats that time. She pondered how many times she’d counted her heartbeats in the time she’d been sitting outside the bedroom, against the door on the other side. She glanced down at her watch. It was 10:45 at night. Fifteen minutes since she’d jumped off of Kyoya Ootori’s bed and locked herself outside his bedroom, plopped down onto the ground and held her head between her knees in embarrassment.

 

She recounted ever moment that had lead up to these ration-less actions. Fifteen minutes since she’d fled from, seventeen minutes since she’d fought, twenty five minutes since she’d bonded with, and thirty minutes since she violated the privacy of the most enigmatic creature she’d ever met. Kyoya Ootori. Her limitless curiosity in him could be wrongfully categorized as obsessive infractuation. Truthfully, she was intrigued by his somehow overflowing, nonexistent emotions. They were there one day, then gone in a second. Well, now she knew an answer. A much more serious and real one then she’d expected.

 

In her more childlike brain, the idea of Kyoya somehow being inhuman or unreal was much easier than facing the reality that everyone could obviously see and chose to avoid. Kyoya had a broken home. A father who pushes everyone away and piles so much work on his children they nearly break, all because he was scared they would lose themselves much like his wife did. The reason Mrs.Ootori is never seen is because she’s resting 6ft under. The explanation for Kyoya’s abnormal behavior was in front of everyone’s eyes, but sometimes we don’t like to face what’s right in front of us.

 

Haruhi’s thoughts were paused as she flinched at a sudden warmth felt through the other side of the door. Someone was sliding down to sit against it from the inside. She puffed out a breath of air, but was not the one who broke the silence.

 

”Guessing that you’re surprised I’m not actually a demon?” His voice sounded playful, and if she hadn’t felt sorry for him she would’ve wanted to punch him.

”I’m sorry I yelled at you, but that book is private. I figured you’d’ve Had more sympathy considering your mother is also deceased.” Even though a wall separated the two, Haruhi could see his face sounding out ever word.

”It’s ok Kyoya-“ First name basis is acceptable at this point right? “- I shouldn’t have looked through that book I just... I don’t know. The answers have always been apparent to me why you are the way you are, I guess I just had a glimmer of hope you weren’t as, forgive me, damaged and scary as I had figured.”

He scoffed and she could perfectly picture his smirk.

”If you want real answers, I’ve basically given up hiding anything from you, you saw what you saw, I apologized for last summer, and you recognize my reasoning for lashing out because of my memory book... so ask away Haruhi.” The way he spoke to her was as if he was shaken from crying. She couldn’t even imagine what he looked like when he cried, it just wasn’t something she could fathom.

She drew in a deep huff of the freezing air in the hallway, and looked up out of the window, the only light source where she was sitting, at the hoard of rain outside, before turning half way around, as if he could see her through the door.

”Do you hate your smile because you look like your mom?”

”Yes and no. My smile is like my Father’s, as you probably saw I look just like him. The only differing factor is my dimples, from my mom. They only show up when I laugh, so I cover them. Whenever they’re pointed out I can see my mom laughing and it’s just-“

”Painful?” She interrupted him again, but she wasn’t concerned.

”Yeah. Do you want the whole story Haruhi? I just realized I hate the game 20 questions and that’s basically what we’re playing.”

She was affronted by his abrasiveness, but was no longer surprised by it.

“Knock yourself out Kyo.” Nickname basis was definitely not ok, but then again this situation isn’t normal in the slightest.

She could feel the warmth of his body through the door shift upright.

“When I was born, it was very clear I was unwanted. I was one of those types of babies that happens even if the wife is on the pill. My parents had a beautiful six year daughter, and two toddler boys who were close enough in age at three and four to one day share my father’s company when he retires. Then I came along. My mom and dad were very young when they got married. My mom was seventeen and my dad was twenty, and everyone is unsure of whether or not is was a shotgun or not because my sister’s age in comparison with theirs could definitely add up, but they both have different stories as to why they did it so early. My mother, along with several other family members on my maternal side suffer from bipolar disorder, and addiction. Unfortunately after I was born, very difficulty, my mom’s addiction gene was triggered by her inability to control herself when taking pain killers and her bipolar medication. They sent her to rehab four times through or my childhood but every time she came back more and more dead inside. My sister and father fought all the time because she blamed him for enabling her, and was overprotective of her because my sister also has the disorder and was caught drinking several times underaged. My brothers were mean to me because I was the mistake baby who made mom take pills, and when my sister ran away from home the last time mom went to rehab, my dad was so angry he banned anyone from even entering her room. The next time I saw my sister was at mom’s funeral seven months later. The last picture taken of my mom was when my dad found her in a motel room near the rehab center getting high as a kite. He took that creepy Polaroid of her buzzed to show her what she was doing to herself, but when she went to sleep alone in the room after he left, she didn’t wake up. After mom’s death I shut myself off, I was going into middle school and I hated everyone. I couldn’t sleep no matter how hard I tried, I was impulsive, I would go to the roof of the house in the freezing rain to feel something, I couldn’t sit still. My dad took me to a doctor and, what do you know! I’m also bipolar! Yay right? That’s when I stopped feeling. I take my meds, when I can be bothered to, and I’m fine, I got better when I made friends with the host club and my dad and sister stopped fighting, but when I don’t take the meds, I do dumb things, like pinning girls I met three weeks ago to beds to prove points, or punch cars, orwatch those same girls on cameras I have in my house while they’re alone in my room. You see where I’m going with this, Haruhi?” His voice had gotten shakier and shakier as he kept going. Haruhi’s eye were craters in her face.

She stayed silent as she absentmindedly reaches around and turned the doorknob above her. She backed up as she pulled the door open, and snapped herself into reality as she looped her arms around Kyoya, sitting with his back to her. She put her chin on his shoulder and the two shared a knowing look of contention. After a few minutes of silence he stood up, turned around and grabbed Haruhi’s hands, pulling her up and bending down to kiss her forehead. She chuckled at him.

It was now 11:56 at night. The two of them laid down in the same bed, not even thinking about who they were lying next too.He laid on his stomach on the side closest to the door. She laid by the window on her back, looking up at the crack in the ceiling. He loosely flung his arm over her stomach and she instinctively snaked her hand over his forearm. She fluttered her eyes shut and a wave of calm and quiet invade the tension of the room, disintegrating it with each passing second. It was thundering consistently every few seconds, but she couldn’t hear it, as she could hear was her own heart beat, and even though she wasn’t close enough physically to hear his, she knew they were in sync. She wondered as she drifted off into slumber if he’s ever gotten closure with anyone in his life until this point. Not that it mattered, it was just another detail she could ask a million questions about.

The morning took forever to come. They never moved positions as they slept, as if they were truly in a state of pure comfort. Kyoya’s alarm rang at 7:30am. Haruhi shot up and he never even budged as she she slid his arm off her body. She leaned over him to push the ‘off’ button and rubbed her eyes. Her phone in her back pocket was nearly dead and she wa sure her eyes were dark and grey from a lack of sleep. She could smell coffee through the vent in Kyoya’s room, and as much as her body begged her to stay in his circle of warm welcome, she knew she had things to do that day. As it was her last free day before they had another normal, hectic school day.

Crawling off of his bed, she admires how defenseless he looked, she internally slapped herself hard for inching closer to his body, violating yet another privacy by watching him sleep. The assault of her heart by her brain has stopped when she saw the faintest of twitches start on the corner of his mouth. It grew wider and his nose scrunched up tighter as it grew , she chuckled as she realized he was smiling her. His dimples appeared for the second time ever to her and his arm reaches out and yanked her back into the bed with him.

“Ah! What’re you doing, Kyoya?!” She yelled playfully as she ended up in the same position on the bed she was previously, except she was now facing him. He propped his head up on his elbow resting on the pillow in an attempt to play it cool, but started snickering almost as soon as he did.

”I’m sorry! I’ve been awake for a while and I thought it would be funny!” He could barely choke out what he was trying to say in laughter and Haruhi jokingly smacked his arm and rolled her eyes.

”I do actually have to go places today, Kyoya, so you might as well let me get up, it’s already 8:13.” Her tone changed back to her regular placidly logic based one, but there was a hint of softness to it now, like the aura of calm hadn’t completely left her yet.

He sighed and rose up from the bed, looked in a nearby mirror and attempted to fix his hair in a perfunctory manor. He turned back around to Haruhi.

”Ok, where are we going?”

”Excuse me? You want to have another Mall adventure?” She chuckled while referencing their last day on the town by themselves.

”Why not, Tamaki is sick, he called me crying about it last night when I was out, the twins are on vacation, Hani and Mori are at practice all day, and I would hang out with my siblings but I’m not in the mood to almost get arrested today.” His alien casualty of voice was nearly offensive to her as she actually contemplated dragging him out with her.

”Ok fine. You can come. Glad to know I’m your literal last resort.” She said that last part sarcastically while over enthusing an eye roll. 

Kyoya went to shower, and he told Haruhi she was welcome to do the same downstairs, and just wear more of the clothes from the other room, or rewash hers from the previous day. She opted to rewash hers as she felt awkward wearing the clothes from a room she was now aware she was technically banned from entering. She was hesitant to do anything in the house at first but she then caught on that it was Sunday, so all the servants weren’t working that day, and Kyoya’s dad had left very early that morning for a trip in Canada. 

As she stepped into the very lavish shower in a downstairs room, she toyed over the thought that it was ironic that there were only two people currently in a house the size of an apartment complex. She dried her deep brown hair with a towel and threw on her newly clean clothes before heading back up the stairs. She paused with her hand on the door knob before removing it and choosing to knock this time.

”Come in.” A yell of confirmation let her know she was in fact, not going to see someone naked.

”Ok so I have a list of all we need to do on my phone, just a warning, it’s not very entertaining stuff.” She walked over the bedside table and unplugged her phone from a charger.

”That’s Fine, I just didn’t want to stay here all alone all day and I enjoy your company so I don’t care what we do.” His hair was now wet and Haruhi took note it was much more attractive then she thought it would be.

Not that she’s thought of how attractive certain things about him could be or anything.

The two made their way downstairs and as they were about to leave, Kyoya was sidetracked by coffee.

”We do not have all day, and the amount of caffeine you ingest can’t be healthy.” She said as she tried to persuade him out the front door.

He rolled his eyes at her and chuckled when she let out a noise of annoyance.

”Listen Haruhi, if I don’t have very high levels of caffeine in my body before ten am, I will break someone’s neck.” He handed her a cup.

”Sure, Kyoya, sure.” She propped herself up on the countertop across from him, and a guilty thought went into her mind. It was a question that needed to be asked, as it was something he often forgot, and he’s not exactly acting how she was used to him acting.

”Haruhi what’re you thinking about this time?” He sipped his coffee as he inquired about her frequent habit of spacing out mid conversation.

”Nothing I was just wondering, um, how do I ask this without offending you, it’s not that I don’t-“

”Yes, I took my meds while you were downstairs, you can ensure you won’t have another outburst from me anytime soon.” He purposefully widened his eyes an smirked at her, and she couldn’t decide whether he was being intentionally creepy or not. But we’ll go with intentional for now.

When they got into the car, Haruhi hesitated getting into the passenger seat and looked knowingly at Kyoya.

”Oh yeah I know how to drive we just don’t have to.” He said as he turned on the car.

The drive to the mall was silent but he opened the door for her to get out of the car when they arrived. As they approached the entrance Kyoya stopped dead in his tracks and shifted his head to look directly at Haruhi.

”Please don’t say anything about last night.” His face conveyed he knew she wouldn’t deep down, but Haruhi knew how upset his tragic backstory made him feel after the previous night. She nodded her head and gave him a warm smile. He clasped his hand in hers and bent down to kiss her forehead again. She scoffed at him when he pulled away.

He gave her a hurt expression and raised his eyebrow.

”You missed.” She stayed plainly and pulled him down to pres their lips together in a soft kiss. She could feel him smile against her mouth and when they pulled away he chuckled at her, dimples and all, and said. 

“You you’re a very peculiar person Haruhi, then again I might be even more strange than you ever could be so maybe you’ll be good for me.” He wrapped his arm around her as they walked and her face grew hot.

Haruhi didn’t know what to expect to become of this newly formed relationship. But after the events of the past 24 hours, she’s learned that expectations are for non peculiar people, and herself and Kyoya might just be the most peculiarly perfect for each other anyone has ever been.


End file.
